Last night I wrestled with an upgrade. The infrequently-used laptop in question had been running a “nightly build” development snapshot of Lakka dating back to December 2016.
Several times over the past 18 months or so I had tried to update this system, both from within the navigation system as well as from the command line (via ssh) using “lakka-upgrade”. The most recent “.img.gz” it would download was the same December 2016 nightly build. I wasn’t fussed about unsuccessful updates since I could still play the games I wanted to play.
Last night I was determined to succeed, and I did!
Using these Lakka Upgrade Unstructions from github, I placed the most recent .img.gz into /storage/.update on my Lakka machine and rebooted. This alone is insufficient. The update did not apply.
I found a helpful bit of info dropped casually at the end of a post on an OpenElec forum, saying that update images must be accompanied by a corresponding hash file, (ie. the md5 file). (The version of Lakka I was running was built on OpenElec. It seems it may be built on LibreElec now.)
Things to do ahead of time:
- Open a web browser and visit the Repository of Lakka builds
- Navigate to the sub directory for your system architecture
- Sort the “Modified” column by date (by clicking the little arrow above that column)
- Locate the most recent Lakka build. There will be a block of files relating to each build/release
- You will need two files which I talk about below
- Don’t download them with your browser
Note: Since OpenElec/Lakka run Avahi (zeroconf) by default, the literal string “lakka.local” should resolve on your local LAN. If you have changed the hostname of your Lakka system, use that hostname in place of “lakka”. I wrote about it earlier in this post. Otherwise, use the ip address of your Lakka machine.
Here’s how… From another machine on your LAN, connect to your Lakka machine
$> ssh [email protected]
From your Lakka machine…
lakka# cd /storage/.update lakka# wget <url for *.img.gz you desire, probably the most recent one> lakka# wget <url for *.md5 corresponding to the *.img.gz you just downloaded> lakka # reboot
To get the URL’s… In your browser window, right-click on the file you need and select “Copy Link Location”. The context menu may be worded slightly differently depending on which browser you use.
I did exactly this. It will probably be different for you.
lakka# cd /storage/.update lakka# wget http://le.builds.lakka.tv/Generic.x86_64/Lakka-Generic.x86_64-2.1.1.img.gz lakka# wget http://le.builds.lakka.tv/Generic.x86_64/Lakka-Generic.x86_64-2.1.1.img.gz.md5 lakka# reboot
System updated no problem